


xii + 365 days

by Anonymous



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, College, Fluff and Angst, Forehead Kisses, Future Fic, Getting Back Together, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Break Up, Post-Canon, Vague Time Skips, there's some fluff bc they deserve to be happy, this is somewhat beta’d but i wrote it in a frenzy so idk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-09
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-10-01 14:34:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10192085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: The times and troubles of living next door toyour ex-boyfriendOikawa Tooru.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [indigostardust](https://archiveofourown.org/users/indigostardust/gifts), [eccentrick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eccentrick/gifts).



> To Jazz and Dawn, for existing and always being so amazing~ ♡ 
> 
> edit: temporary(?) title change.

_i. a view of these streets_

 

“Hajime,” his cousin calls, lifting the blinds of the kitchen window by a pinch of her fingers and peering out, eyebrows raised in amused interest. “Is your neighbor a cat person?”

Hajime pauses from trying to cut the vegetables. Without scrapes of knife on chopping board or their chatter filling in the spaces, the noise of a shenanigan right outside the apartment building seeps in, muffled and vague, but overlaid clear by memory.

He snorts. “He damn wished he was,” Hajime just tells her, instead. A moment later, a cat’s yowl of righteous anger pierces through the walls four stories up, clanks of trash cans toppling against the innocent mailbox, and a certain someone curses all the way to the heavens for yet another set of claw marks on his ~~beautiful~~ ~~flawless~~ insufferably annoying face.

His cousin whistles, eyes still on the scene. “That looks like it'd sting.”

By now, Hajime knows the man is stomping his foot as he stands on the cracked step to the apartment’s porch, indignant in the face and hair a bit tousled. Five seconds later, he’d cross his arms, grumbling on about evil felines and the superstitions they serve to perpetuate. His shoulders would ease out of their hunch, then, and he’d sigh, give up the ghost of a smile with no one to catch, and leave a bag full of treats for the cat and her kittens, anyway.

(Hajime won't be there to sigh at this; he won't be there to shove star-patterned band-aids into calloused hands with a click of the tongue, to flick a worried forehead in playful chiding, to shoot him a discreet, fond smile as he rambles on about cats and volleyball and everything and anything and nothing.)

Hajime looks down at his hands, the pads of his fingers pruned from washing the vegetables prior, skin unscathed. He’s been getting real good at handling the kitchen knife, can't help but keep up the routine of cooking for two instead of one. Somewhat a blessing, since now he always has enough for a guest's visit. “It does,” Hajime whisper-says, feeling the sting of a thousand cuts.

She hums, slides the blinds to either side in welcoming a mild sunny weather, and goes to join him at the counters.

Outside his door, the man jogs up the stairs to a shared fourth floor, jitters and adrenaline of a late-morning run coursing through. He halts by a door with _Iwaizumi_ scrawled on the nameplate beside it, and past the music blasting from his earphones, past the bleats and rumble of traffic revving up all over a city that never sleeps, the distant footfalls of harried salarymen and students alike clambering up for another endless day ahead, he treads on without a sideway glance.

_Forward._

_Onward._

 

 

* * *

 

  
_ii. for the undecided, a toast_

 

“Hey,” says Kuroo Tetsurou, a fellow refugee from Organic Chemistry, “you okay, Iwaizumi?”

Hajime had broken a plethora of promises he’d kept for the last twenty years in just one day. _Don't make Tooru cry. Play volleyball with him and reach for the top. Never stay still for too long._

_When he's up in the clouds, be his grounding force—but don’t forget to dream big, too._

_Always hug the breath out of him when he does cry, because everything won't always go right and you both need to forgive yourselves and get your shits together._

_Let him take care of you, too._

_Stay by his side._

In turn, he drags his glass of beer closer, lets its cold surface and the drones of the izakaya’s patrons lull him into something numb, and blinks back the sting behind his eyes. Those midnight study sessions must’ve started getting to him. “New neighbors moved in next door—they aren't exactly quiet.” Hajime lets it trail off into a light chuckle. “I couldn't get as much sleep.” _Not any._

From the lack of any sneer on Kuroo’s part, and the fact that he looks like a kicked kitten as he listens to the lie, Hajime assumes he’s failed miserably. It slips right by him that he's dealing with a to-be psychiatrist, sometimes.

“Trouble in paradise?” Kuroo prods.

Hajime holds back a sigh, perching his chin on top of a propped palm. “You know how it is with best friends. Childhood best friends. The stubbornness goes both ways.”

“Ah, I feel ya, man. Kenma can hold grudges for a while after we get into a fight with each other.” Kuroo takes a mouthful of his own poison, swallows, not a drop left astray. “But”—he thumbs at the rim of his glass—“we always come back together, eventually. He stays with me, even though sometimes—okay, a lot of times—I’m a provocative jerk and do stupid things.” He grins, gaze turning somewhere far away.

Sentimental Kuroo is honest Kuroo, Hajime muses. Or maybe it’s the other way around.

Kuroo looks at him. Huh. Did Hajime say that out loud? “I don't deserve him in a million years,” Kuroo adds. “Doesn't mean we won't try our best every single day, yeah?”

 _Did you fall in love with him?_ Hajime wants to ask. _Did you ever break his heart?_ is what he doesn't say.

_Did you hear him crying next door, and you stay still, even though he was so within reach?_

Hajime just lifts his glass lightly and in offering. For what occasion, he doesn't quite know. Maybe for _best friends_ or _trying every day_ , or a plea for forgiveness, or something else far less poignant. But Kuroo grins again, if a tad wistful, and the clink of their glasses echoes long in Hajime's head even after it’s soon drowned by a world that goes on and on spinning, like vows failed to be kept.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_iii. the roads they gather_

 

The longest stretch of time they hadn't seen each other was in second grade, when Hajime went down with the worst case of a fever and flu combo just days before Christmas, and both mothers agreed to separate the inseparable friends, for now. _How ugly_ , Hajime had thought of Oikawa's scrunched up and wrinkled face, all his tear-stained and snot-stuffed glory, as the other boy began crying in earnest even though it was Hajime who’d been in the throes of sickness.

Oikawa had wailed and kicked back to return by Hajime's side, and in perhaps the only punishment by the gods he could ever be thankful for, he was struck a week later with a case of chickenpox that had spread through the neighborhood’s kids. When Hajime got it, too, a few days farther on, their mothers relented, and just let them hole up together to build blanket fort after blanket fort and marathon enough Studio Ghibli movies to last two lifetimes.

(Though not before Hajime had tackled Oikawa to the ground and straddled his back, demanding an apology for _getting yourself sick, you dumbass_ , and a pinky swear not to let it happen again _ever_ , the latter whining all the while to be let go, how _not gentle_ his Iwa-chan was.

“You can't ever have enough of Studio Ghibli movies,” Hajime had argued later that same night.

Oikawa had gaped at him. “But those space documentaries are much cooler!”)

In yet the most pathetic attempt of avoiding each other, nearly two decades later, they last eight days. To their credit, neither of them planned a reunion. In staying one, two steps ahead of the already grueling National team’s training regimen, though now more mindful of his health, Oikawa runs a couple of kilometers every day except on Monday. (Because _Monday_ will always be _a day to rest_ , Seijoh or not; and it's this way, still, when he slips and overworks and Hajime couldn't rein him in fast enough.)

He’d take off at the break of dawn when there's no morning practice; in the evening, otherwise. Hajime knows ~~their~~ his route like the back of those hands, those lithe fingers calloused and whetted to orchestrate the most perfect of tosses, that demon of a serve. (And so much more.) Oikawa would run along the sidewalk, greet the obaachan preparing to open up her flower shop for the day, stop to offer and insist help, if she seems to need it, and be released only with a fresh blossom tucked behind his ear.

He likes Inokashira Park best, the colorful trees and the pond and the Kanda River. He’d linger just to watch them, just to breathe; for all how ready-made Oikawa Tooru is to see the world, something golden in the making— _to persist_ , in spite of all odds—they are still boys of Sendai, Miyagi, and Tokyo is bound to be some wonder to take in parts and pieces. It is a collage of puzzles, of time and places to collect in these small encounters, and then stitch together while lying sprawled on the comfy blanketed floor of a home, those languid days buzzing along them by the tinkles of windchime in a gentle breeze; with their pair of clasped hand outstretched to the ceiling, reaching skyward, skin contrasting but casted in light all the same, a lamp overhead transforms into miniature sun by force of perspective.

Hajime would’ve lingered to watch him, in this park, a brilliant star from Hajime's own narrow but ever expanding world of view, waiting for that tiniest curve of a smile which told of something sincere. Oikawa would never be caught dead wearing that in public, with anyone else except the closest of friends or behind the locked doors to his and Hajime's bedroom.

They would've returned home side by side, races and petty challenges saved for another day because _the trip home_ should not be taken for granted, their shoulders bumping one another's every minute or so to resist holding hands. _I’m here. We're here._ Quite often, it would've turned into a shoving match that devolved into tickling or something equally, disgustingly sweet. Noticing the eyes watching them soon enough, they would've sprung up to their feet, given deep bows in comical sync, said a chorus of _sorry_ ’s to the curious stares, and bickered all the jog home until those doors close and keys turn and—

(Would have. _Would have would have would have._

If there's one lesson Hajime carries on from volleyball, it's to never dwell on past losses.)

So. Oikawa goes on a run most days of the week. Hajime makes do with his class schedule and tries to keep his consistent, as he does not have the same birthright of academic intellect, grabbing onto his scholarship and powering through by sheer force of hard-work and will and too many cups of tea. He runs because it is ingrained in him—in the both of them—to never stay still, and he also has a reputation to uphold (Hanamaki: 0, Kyoutani: 1, Iwaizumi: 187) and for the health benefits, too. There are people he wants to take care of, after all. Like his family, and his underclassmen from Seijoh, and Takeru, and the cat with her kittens hidden at the base of his apartment building.

So. Hajime goes on runs, too. Oikawa's paths mapped into the back of his eyelids, Hajime starts half an hour after him. He veers left instead of right from the apartment's front, taking wrong turns around corners, through crossroads and alleyways, staying within the shopping area of Kichijoji.

( _Wrong wrong wrong._ It feels wrong. It's breaking a bone-deep habit. Breaking a rule, a _law_ of their years’ making.

It's denying memories and instincts built, polished, and strengthened over the course of their lives.

It's going against something inevitable, anyway.)

 

 

* * *

 

_iv._

 

(But that's what they have always done, isn't it? Going against geniuses and prodigies, against the insurmountable odds of nature. Fighting with a knee once injured and perhaps never recovered and winning, _anyway_ , to see through another toss for a wing spiker that is neither the prefecture's favorite nor perfect, this trust between them.

Losing again, and a _next time_ proclaimed, confided, through tears shed and confessions tumbling out of bitten lips, all sealed with a fist bump.

_Next time, we’ll win for sure._

_Next time._

_Next time._ )

 

 

* * *

 

 

_v. so i'd see you again, then_

 

_Next time._

For once, it is Hajime's head that's up in the clouds. With mind hazy, his body moves on instinct, directed by muscle memory, breathes in the cool morning air and out the foggy exhales. There’s less dew in the city’s wind than in Sendai's; in this, he tastes ash and dust, but not of the choking, throat-grating kind. Closer to the musky scent of sandalwood or some aftermath of a cloudburst, the sparks of train wheels grinding against steel tracks and a heralding thunder electrifying the air, it is something Hajime imagines a fireplace would smell like when lit during a storm.

He flies and lands to the drumming of his heart, the pulse pounding inside his ears. Pavement and asphalt road a solid presence under his running shoes, each impact shoots up his bones. The dull ache is welcomed, a distraction from the sharp prickle in his chest that has nothing to do with his heaving for oxygen and everything with the infuriating tenacity of faith.

_Perfect sync._

_Perfect trust._

_Too much faith can blind you_. This, Hajime reminds himself of, once more, pushing back the _why why why_ screaming along his footfalls. _Why did you push Tooru away? Why did you let him cry, you fucking idiot—_

 _Because we grew up,_ he snaps back, and it grants him silence in exchange for his heart being twisted over like cloth, as if wringing out all the blood.

When Hajime takes another turn, admittedly not keeping track of where he’s going, he sees a more-than-known figure walking his way, earphones on and head down as he muses over a playlist, their apartment a destination in the middle, and he stifles the urge to laugh.

 _Of course._ Because even Hajime's memory betrays him, leading right back to _him_ , to _together_ , even when he tells himself to sprint like hell the other way.

Because through the disparity of time and places, they still find each other. Hajime's never been a believer of fate, that things are set in stone, like how natural-born talents and geniuses are meant to conquer. He’s seen, _known_ , how a person can break through that unclimbable fortress, a meteor crashing through the atmosphere: swift, and luminous and burning, and demanding all eyes to _look_ , a force challenging nature’s hold on the Earth itself.

So. _Break it_ , he thinks. Break the cycle before it worsens, before it breaks _them_. There's no such thing as fate, but there are _causes and effects_. Things inevitable, like best friends drifting apart or distances gnawing at first loves until nothing remains, the process wretched and heartrendingly painful, and so Hajime thinks of preventing two such casualties.

By the mailbox, its paint chipped, metal scratch-marked from disastrous meetings with protective mother cats, they come to a brief stop. Oikawa looks up as he stands beside it, has already memorized the length of strides it takes to reach it, his cheeks flushed from exertion, breaths still a tad heavier, and meets Hajime’s gaze.

Neither glances away and so Hajime just sends a curt nod, and Oikawa mashes his lips shut before he can utter a sound, and gives up a double-edged sword of a smile.

Together, yet so far apart, they come home.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_vi. seven gods in a grain of rice_

 

“Help me, _please_.”

Hajime squints through the gap between his front door and its frame. “Oikawa, it's four in the morning.”

“I know!” Oikawa hushes out. He rakes his fingers through his hair and tugs, all rumpled as his clothes. There are pink imprints on his cheeks similar to the pattern of keyboard. “Just. Okaasan is coming over and I _have_ to show her I can live by myself—you know how she’d get too worried. She’d want to know if I can cook properly and _I ran out of rice_. Let me borrow some?”

He claps his hand together as if in prayer, hunching up his shoulders and eyes crinkled shut in the usual theatrics. When Hajime just stares on, mulling over his life choices and the unwritten thesis boring a hole into his bed-deprived back from the living room, Oikawa dares to peek out of one eye. “Oh. And I don't have a cooker,” he adds, ever pleasant.

 _Of course you don't_ , Hajime thinks, exasperated, yet nostalgic. If not for takeout leftovers, that dumbass wouldn't even have rice in the first place. Aside from Hajime's attempts at _proper meals_ and his own hazardous escapades in gourmet baking, Oikawa has so far lived off of protein bars, milk breads, and fruits, plus whatever sweets or bentos his fans spoil him with.

Had. Had lived off. Hajime shouldn't assume what Oikawa's up to nowadays.

(He knows, either way.)

Behind his clasped hands, Oikawa's smile is tight.

With dawn yet to break, city lights far in the background or too low to reach, the dark circles of his eyes seem vivid under the nightlight just outside of Hajime’s doorstep. Hajime takes in this view, the mussed hair and paler face and milk-chocolate eyes with lids threatening to droop, the drawl of life on the streets below, and chides himself for allowing such blunder when he sees that smile widen by the millimeters.

Closing the door with a loud _thunk_ , he pinches the bridge of his nose, glasses pushed up and sliding out of its perch, and sends a silent apology to their neighbors for the unbidden disturbance. Sighs held, he unhooks the chain anchoring the door to the wall and opens it up again, finding Oikawa’s ever round eyes behind it. “Come in, then,” Hajime says, stepping back to walk on ahead.

“I assume you know how to cook rice?” he asks over his shoulder.

Oikawa’s locked the door and ignored the guest’s slippers to prance around in those stupid alien socks Hajime had bought him years ago. Hajime watches on as his face go slack, as if he's realized a sudden betrayal.

“Iwa-chan!” Oikawa gripes. A second too-long hush that looms afterward tells of the slip; he opens his mouth, closes it, and resorts to a ( _wrong wrong wrong_ ) grin. “I’ve grown up, you know,” he recites the words, something tremulous, _hurt_ , to his voice. If he spots Hajime’s suppressed wince, the automatic twitch to _reach out_ , he doesn't say. “I think I can handle it, hm?”

Hajime wipes at bleary eyes, settles down at the kotatsu, and focuses back on the blank document page glaring from his laptop screen. “Suit yourself.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Oikawa can't handle it.

“ _Dumbass_ ,” Hajime just growls out, yanking Oikawa's hand away from the bubbling top of the ricecooker and dragging him toward the sink. Its handle jams but he forces it to the side without delay, letting cool water run over a blooming red patch on Oikawa's palm.

“You need these hands for volleyball,” Hajime says, to fill in the white-noise of rushing water. Oikawa's gaze burns at the nape of his neck. “Take care of them, dumbass.”

“Iwa-chan,” Oikawa starts. He chuckles, somewhat croaky. “Is—Is _dumbass_ still the only insult you know?”

It hurts to smile like this, Hajime thinks. It hurts, too, to deny him of it.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_vii. track record_

 

For someone who's always so talkative, who thrives on the center court and breezes through a whirlwind of social life, who blasts music _all the damn time_ with volume set just grating enough to Hajime's ears, his silence is deafening.

Through these walls is a record, of some sort: classical music for when Oikawa's studying with grave focus (it makes Hajime sleepy, in a nice way); the tense but weirdly invigorating soundtracks from boss fights as he’s cramming for late papers or dreadful exams (these are the loudest); hip hop, when he's pissed off and fuming (—Hajime’s comfort songs, too, if he's honest with himself); and favorites of younger days, lyrics and beats long ingrained in the both of them, on better times. But always, _always_ something.

When it becomes too quiet, he’s either pulling another all-nighter and killing his computer with DVDs of volleyball matches, or—

Or.

Hajime glances up from his assignment, a headache between his temples screeching of random scientific terms, and tries to recall where the clock is or if there's even any within sight. Gaze riveted to a hairline crack in the wall, mustering no energy for any thorough search, he just feels around for his phone— _23:16_. It's way late, today. He sets it down.

_00:19_

_00:50_

Fuck advanced statistics.

_01:02_

Hajime considers the benefits and losses of making another pot of tea.

_01:11_

It was Wednesday. There hadn't been crumbs near the cats’ den; Oikawa hadn't gone for a run.

Cracks in the wall taunt him, the barrier standing between them so thin, brittle. Hajime could make a dent in it any fucking day and Oikawa's serve would punch a hole straight through it.

He gets up, legs all pins and needles from sitting far too long, and pads toward the kitchen to where he thinks he's left his laptop. It's dark, outside his bedroom, and he bumps into tables and stubs his toes on prickly corners, but nevertheless survives the perilous quest. Prize in hand, Hajime settles down to lean against the wall he shares with _next door_ , starts up his laptop, almost goes blind by the sudden glaring light, and browses through tens of gigabytes worth of movies he absolutely hates.

He picks one, anyway, a childhood’s best-loved back when everything was as simple as climbing trees and pretend-adventures and being happy, and maxes out the volume through the roof.

To the noises of aliens screaming and horribly unrealistic space battles, he dozes off to, for once, a restful sleep.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

_viii._

 

Oikawa looks shitty on their next run. When Hajime mentions this, he just smiles, brighter than he’s had in weeks; Hajime just scoffs, refrains from telling him _take care of yourself, dumbass_ , and goes his other way.

(“Tooru-kun, you seem happier today,” a flower-shop owner notes.

“Hm?” he hums out, grazing the amaryllis nestled in his hair by the softest of touch, a _thank you_ for today's aid. He peers up at the sunrise. “Nice weather, today.”)

 

 

* * *

 

 

_ix. the simplification of truth_

 

Hanamaki slides next to him and closes Hajime's textbook with a decisive _thud_. It speaks of how much of a mess Hajime is that he doesn't register the act until several blinks later.

“No more of that,” Hanamaki scolds. He flops onto the cushion beside Hajime, legs criss-crossed, and shoots him _the stare_. _As your friend, I demand you to be reckless for once and have fun._ “Honestly, Iwaizumi. This is a sacred gathering and you _dare_ bring schoolbooks along?”

Hajime doesn't spare a pause. “Don't talk like you hadn't crammed on law studies until Matsukawa and I had to sling you over our shoulders and march you out into the outside world.”

“Right. But I’ve _never_ violated the sanctity of our rendezvous. Not like this vile crime you’ve committed.”

“Why must you guys’ jokes always be like this?”

Hanamaki smirks, and it's so refreshing to see his friend that Hajime forgets to scowl. “It's only dirty if you’ve got a dirty mind.”

Hajime cracks a smile in spite of himself. He tucks away the uncertainty of later days to count this blessing of a much-needed reunion and lets himself welcome the things of old days, like lunches on Seijoh’s rooftop or the four of them walking home together or failing a group study with unforeseen solidarity, laughing and shoving and teasing and just _there_.

“Poor Kindaichi,” Hanamaki whispers in all solemness. He shakes his head. “He has no idea how despicable his favorite senpai’s mind is.”

“Wasn't it Oikawa? He always had this awed look when Oikawa served. And he looked up to Matsukawa as a middle blocker, too.”

The expression Hanamaki directs at him is the epitome of deadpan. “Iwaizumi, how dense can you be?” he says, and Hajime cracks a laugh, too, in the end.

“Where’s Matsukawa?” Hajime asks, passing over one of the menus for the other man to skim through. They’d agreed on a restaurant well-known enough to be a treat but still reasonable for a couple of not-so well-off college students. Hanamaki and Matsukawa had taken a train ride to the Kichijoji Station, intending to crash at their friends’ for two or three days of sightseeing Musashino and what they could of Tokyo, given the ever present time constraint.

Oikawa had been _delighted_ when he, via Skype, declared himself to be their omniscient tour guide, to Matsukawa's unfazed stare and Hanamaki’s slow fake-sympathetic clapping, Hajime himself not even trying to hide a snort. He’d put up a show of being indignant at the unappreciative responses, but his grin lingered for the longest while, all dorky and unfashionable in that genuine way of his, and so no one had any desire to refute.

Hanamaki flips to the last few pages without preamble, always _that one guy_ who orders desserts first (and sometimes _only that_ ) and feels no remorse for such barbarity. “I think he and Oikawa might've gotten lost somewhere.”

“What is it, now.”

“Oikawa dragged him to—this trife shop? And he told me to meet up with you first. _Stop Iwa-chan from shrinking his already pea-sized brain!_ he’d said. And his hunch was correct.” He sends Hajime such a disapproving look that it culls his annoyance at Oikawa’s words into a quiet, rusty chuckle. At the somewhat forced levity, Hanamaki's gaze softens in the way only few would recognize. Hajime tries for a smile. _Let's not_ , it says, and at this Hanamaki seems to hold back a sigh. He points at the textbook still on the table, accusing. “Put that abomination away. I do not want to see it or any of its kin during our stay in this pleasant neighborhood.”

Rolling his eyes, Hajime quips back, “You’re the guest, you know,” though he goes to stow the offender in his knapsack.

“Just a guest? Iwaizumi, I’m truly hurt. I thought we were more than this.”

Their lost friends come tumbling in with a clatter louder than the doorbell or the following _irasshaimase!_ , like a pair of drunken birds that had crashed into storefront windows, and they look part like it: beanie and woollen hat slipping to the side, exposing tufts of messy hair (though this is arguable, in Matsukawa's case); scarves and peacoats in various states of disheveled (so garish in colors, too, the ones Oikawa had picked for himself); and the both of them attempting to regain balance while hurrying bows in apology to the startled employees, careful of shuffling around in their snow-slicked shoes. Hajime’s turned to watch the spectacle unravel with amusement, or something he dares call wistful fondness, and behind him he can hear Hanamaki snicker.

Ever laidback, Matsukawa ambles out of the scene with his trademark relaxed-slouching gait, hooded-eyes and a slight upturn of his mouth betraying no embarrassment, if he even feels any. Oikawa skips over to their table, the lower half of his face huddled under a multitude of scarves from pastel to neon, all patterned, some ridiculously so. He’s ruddy from the tip of his ears to across his cheeks and nose, always the easy target for winter chill despite that one-hundred and eighty-six centimeters. The faint crinkles at the corners of his eyes might've been a tell of a smile, anyway.

Hanamaki raises a non-existent eyebrow as they settle down. “You guys didn't buy anything?”

“Yeah, about that,” Matsukawa volunteers, and Oikawa whips his head around to face him and _squawks_ , for some reason. “There was—”

“Mattsun!” Oikawa hisses out, tugging his scarves down so as to not sound muffled. “You promised!” he says, and Hanamaki's mouth opens in an 'O’, a mischievous glint already in his eyes.

Hajime sips at his obligatory tea, glancing down to read the menu he’s neglected as the duo poke at Oikawa for tidbits of a previous incident. He thinks it’s been months since he witnessed Oikawa all bundled up in winter clothes, rosy-cheeked, the whiteness of the season and his fairer skin drawing attention to a pair of pinkish lips more than ever; the way he lights up as he greets old friends, best friends, allowing himself, for once, to be just happy; and it is in moments like this that Hajime can say he understands the meaning of _bittersweet_ , from one end of the spectrum to the other and everything else in-between. In turn, he thinks to not dwell on the futility it too much.

(Two of his scarves are the ones Hajime had bought for him: a glow-in-the-dark, galaxy-patterned one for Christmas and another the turquoise of Seijoh with little cartoonish leaves scattered, after Oikawa had lamented how _amazing_ their kohai were doing even without their _wonderful ex-captain._

Hajime wonders if he notices, too, or if it's just for convenience's sake.

With Oikawa Tooru, though, nothing has ever been convenient.)

 

 

* * *

 

  

As the designated chaperone— _“An honorable sacrifice,”_ as he’d claimed the position to be—Matsukawa is the only one the slightest bit tipsy while the rest of them are tipping into progressive levels of inhibition.

“So,” Matsukawa drawls, leaning forward to steal a shrimp chip from Hajime's pile. Hajime shoots him a glare and tries to swipe at the thieving hand only to miss by a wide breadth which is ridiculous because he is not _that_ drunk—has the highest tolerance, in fact, out of the four of them, this small team of giants except for Hajime himself with his _cursed below one-eighty_ height so _take that, you tall people_ —and he determines that the warmth of the kotatsu is making his brain a tad hazier. It's nice. And comfy. But maybe they should've crashed at Oikawa's place, even if it means going without the kotatsu and tripping over stray volleyballs. They all will certainly make a mess of everything. They will find a way. Matsukawa and Hanamaki always find a way.

He should check whether Oikawa is tinkering around in the kitchen again. Another near-house fire is really something he can't afford, and Oikawa being all cheery and cute wearing that hideous E.T. apron isn't worth it. Not at all.

“—Iwaizumi?”

He blinks. “Yeah?”

“So,” Matsukawa repeats, and Hajime narrows his eyes, hearing the beginning of _a talk_. He’s sort of been expecting it. Friends do that. “Why stay here?”

“It's my apartment. I rented it.”

A shrill of giggles interspersed with snorts resounds from the couch. Oikawa's captured Hanamaki again and is tickling him, showing no mercy, the both of them threatening to topple over and devastate the blanket fort they’ve set up. Hajime’s couch isn't made to handle two grown men (who are also _above one-eighty_ , damnit) wrestling for dominance. He and Oikawa had discovered it the troublesome way.

“You know what I mean,” Matsukawa adds. “Why live next door to him?”

Hajime shrugs. He thinks to play stubborn, today. They already know. They’ve known since Oikawa moved out and stayed over at their place for a couple of days after the fallout. _Take responsibility for our couch, Iwaizumi,_ Hanamaki had called him the next day, on Hajime's train ride to Miyagi. _Pretty sure those tears and snots won't wash away._

“Someone has to keep an eye out on him,” he says, now, if perhaps too quiet. The tickle-fight table has turned and Hanamaki's got Oikawa straddled by the waist, a devil's grin splitting his features in halves, and Oikawa screeches out a chortle before he can realize to be afraid. It's been a long time, too, since Hajime's heard this laugh. “I’ve been doing it for two decades, so I may as well keep the job.”

“If it's only that, you would've been fine with sharing living space. Cheaper rent and all, too.” Matsukawa steals another chip and Hajime doesn't move to stop him. He doesn't go to eat it, though, and just meets Hajime's eyes with something knowing in his own.

“Can't we not talk about this tonight?” Hajime asks, and sighs, more tired than anything demanding. “Never thought of you as being the killjoy, Matsukawa.”

“You're in pain, Iwaizumi. You both are.”

A dull _thud_ as their friends tumble off of the couch, getting themselves tangled up in the blankets and pillows remains of the fort. Oikawa scrambles to get away, dashing out of the living room with Hanamaki hot on his tail, the latter with a large blanket in hand to presumably trap Oikawa in, both laughing all their merry way.

There's a difference between pain and suffering, Hajime thinks.

“Living with him was—it’s _maddening_ ”—he doesn't really know, where he's going with this—“he’d break every kitchen appliance, from the coffee pot to the microwave to the stove. He’d poison you with your favorite food. He’d blast music all the damn time and have some of the neighbors banging on the walls. He’d flirt with the landlady. He’d wake you up by blowing raspberry _into your ear_ , or tickling your feet, or jostling you until you both fall onto the cold floor. He’d insist on personally feeding the cats on the street even though they distrust him, and so you’d have to buy a shit ton of band-aids every time. He’d come home late and leave you worried because he’d turned off his phone during extra-practice.

“And gods, he’s still so _petty_. He’d get into prank fights with you, like dyes in your shampoo or jumpscares on your laptop. He’d pour salt over your food, sometimes, without you realizing it until it's too late, and then he’d laugh at you in—in this inelegant and snort-y way his face would crinkle with it. He’d get competitive with rivals and nearly blow his knee by being too hard on himself again. And you couldn't always be there for him.”

The last part comes as an afterthought, yet it bellows the loudest, like how the end is almost always more spectacular than the beginning, some epilogue more awaited than the prologue. A gleeful yelp from outside the room punctuates the stillness clawing in between them. Hajime rolls his glass, sloshing the beer in it around, and finds a melody in the chaos, the clinking of ice cubes against glass and the drag of glass against the kotatsu's wood. His fingers feel numb, clutching at its coldness.

“I kinda like putting up with his crap, though,” Hajime says, a whispered glossary. Head suddenly heavy, he catches it on a hand propped by the elbow, the cold of his fingers seeping into his forehead, to his half-shut eyes, a slow awakeness in this swimming haze.

Matsukawa huffs, a slight mirth to his breath. “Really, it's plain obvious to everyone who has at least half a brain.” He leans back on one palm, nibbling at his shrimp chip. “I think Oikawa's hiding a volleyball in that thick skull of his, though. It took forever before you guys got together. Well, together-together, because of the childhood friends thing.”

Even if it sounds not all there, Hajime lets out a laugh. “We’ve been together since birth,” he corrects. “But it's not too late. We’d only been dating for three years. We’re just creeping into twenty-two. If it ended now”—he bites the inside of his cheek, hard—“it wouldn't do that much damage, not as permanent.”

The way Matsukawa looks at him now is similar to Hanamaki's, and sometimes Hajime finds something like serendipity in this, how they have so much in common while he and Oikawa are a boundless list of differences.

Tooru is made for the stratosphere, and Hajime can't afford to chain him to the ground forever.

Matsukawa shakes his head, tips back his chosen can of beer, and tells him, “For once, you're an idiot.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Hajime fails to smile. “I know.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

_x. in sickness, in health_

 

Mid-December brings with it the heaviest snowfall Tokyo has seen in fifteen years. Sporting a fever of thirty-nine degrees, nose clogged up and coughs rattling his lungs, Hajime thinks _how untimely_ before he sneezes again, spilling a few scalding drops of tea from his shaky grip on the cup. He thinks to continue packing for winter break, the trip home to his parents' house in Miyagi for Christmas, but finds himself too frazzled to do any semblance of the task competently.

Even though he’d always prepare a list, packing last-minute was Oikawa's job. All rushed, he’d still get that smug grin on his face when they discovered that Hajime, for all his _inappropriately early_ packing, had forgotten a thing or two, and declared himself and his infallible list to be _saviors of the day_. Hajime snorts at the memory and almost chokes himself on a string of coughs that follows after.

He thinks he might've dozed off for some indefinite amount of time, the skyview from the window ever a timeless slate gray, clouds melancholic and snow keen on falling. He blinks to awareness to the end credit of _Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah_ flashing on his laptop, a series of knocks from beyond the front door that echoes like incoming headaches. It's so tempting to ignore everything of outside world, Hajime muses. ( _Iwa-chan has always been a boy of summer._ ) He considers lying down with limbs akimbo as if sprawled on the grass bed of a familiar park, maybe rolling under the kotatsu entirely and just hibernates, but the _thud thud thud_ keeps on existing despite his efforts.

Groaning, he stands up, anyway. He stretches out his spine, arms reaching upward, and regrets it a little when headrush makes everything woozy for a second. “Coming!” he calls out to the persistent someone, coming to get the door.

Oikawa waves at him from behind it, wearing a grin too hopeful for this bleak day. “Iwa-chaaan,” he chirps, and Hajime notices the hand he’s hiding behind his back, the way he bounces on his heels a bit with suppressed jitters, like how someone might tap their shoe in nervous rhythm.

Hajime clears his throat, deems it a fruitless exercise (because Oikawa will know, too. Because whatever this is between them, it has always went both ways), and with all the croaky and hoarseness of a sore throat, greets back, “Oikawa.”

“You haven't gone on a run for four days straight,” Oikawa mentions.

“It's goddamn winter, you know.” _You should rest as well, dumbass._

Oikawa leans in to peek between the spaces, eyes hunting for things he already knows. Hajime bites down the urge to snap at him to put on his ugly scarves and peacoats because it couldn't have been five minutes yet he's already so flushed across the cheeks. “Did you get yourself sick, Iwa-chan?”

“I did,” he admits. There's no volleyball practices to run or tournaments to train for, or work and exams to wage immediate war with, and so he finds no use to lie about it. It's one of the few things he's learned in these past three years, at least.

Always with the breeze, Oikawa strolls past him and into the genkan (when did Hajime unlock the chain?), hand kept hidden, feet covered in stupid alien socks again.

He tuts. “Iwa-chan, you're tough and roughed and all, but you always seem to get sick near Christmas.”

“Nice to hear I’m still human.”

A hum, gazes meet and averted, and with that Oikawa turns to pad down the hall. Hajime closes the door, hand lingering on the metal knob as warmth from the skin trickles away.

In thoughts passing, he wonders how much the fever would thwart his judgement. He thinks of Oikawa, his perennial cold hands and feet that always jolted Hajime awake with how freezing they'd gotten if he wasn't cocooned in blankets from head to toe. He thinks of cheeks turned rosy-pink just from a minute under winter sky, or from unexpected kisses on the forehead, how he still looks for Hajime even though they run their separate ways. And he decides, then, that Oikawa might as well need a huddle under the kotatsu, too.

 

 

* * *

 

 

(And—

And Hajime thinks Oikawa deserves all the warmth the world could offer, anyway.)

 

 

* * *

 

 

Hajime stares, and stares. “What is this?”

Oikawa beams at him. “It’s _agedashi tofu_ , you silly.”

“It's homemade,” Hajime echoes the thought ringing in his head, thumbing at the sides of the container.

It's nothing grand, a plain white-and-teal mimicry of a bento box but with all kinds of washi tape and stickers decorating it, from Oikawa's planets and starry dots to Hajime’s tiny Godzillas, everything worn and familiar. The content is messy, and still so warm.

At the disbelief, Oikawa just pouts. “I _know_ how to cook, you know.” He crosses his arms, nose turned up in a prideful huff. “ _Agedashi_ isn't that hard.”

“ _Agedashi_ is so far the only thing you can cook without setting things on fire. I know that. Just—it usually doesn't smell this good.”

It's Oikawa’s turn to gape. “But you’ve always eaten it and said it's good!”

“I don’t remember ever saying that.”

“You do this _grunt_ , and—and this frowny-but-not-really face that means you're reluctantly enjoying something.”

“Oikawa, that doesn't make any sense. And stop that—your face looks even weirder.”

With a groan of the exasperated sort, Oikawa slouches and just smushes one cheek against the kotatsu. He’s already half-swallowed by the blanket, clutching a stray pillow to his chest. Hajime tightens his grip on the container in his lap and denies any urge to check if those hands are still cold.

Oikawa peers up at him. “Had I been been poisoning you all this time, then?” he asks, voice somewhat muffled from his squished face.

“It was more like you poisoned me by feeding me too much of it,” Hajime says. “I almost got sick of it for a week.”

“ _That_ is what doesn't make any sense. Me, I can always eat milk bread every day,” Oikawa declares with some wide-eyed wonder. “I can eat milk bread every day,” he repeats in a murmur, as if brewing up a diabolical plan, and Hajime halts that train of thought by a hit upside the head and, if gentler, ruffling his hair, to Oikawa's aggrieved whine.

“Don’t try to bake in bulk after this,” Hajime warns. “I live next-door and I’d very much like to see through the rest of my life without any more exploding stoves.”

“You put so little trust in me.”

 _I trust you too much._ “No one in their right mind would trust you in the kitchen.”

_I don't trust myself to not hold you back._

They settle into some kind of quiet, the languid of summer days and the somber of tempestuous snowstorm at once. Under the lights-off of the living room, kept so for sake of minimizing Hajime's headache, the dimmed laptop screen casts the softest glow on what it can reach. In the light of another old days’ favorite, still a thing of comfort even now, Hajime sees Oikawa in all plainness, unblemished with masks or worry lines, or even that ever-present vigilance to _reach higher_ ; he thinks to keep this view close, in spite of all growing distances.

Oikawa turns his head and nuzzles into Hajime's hand still in his hair. Hajime freezes at the warm breaths ghosting over it, at the blistering touch of Oikawa's soft cheek, and Oikawa grasps his wrist before he can even think to pull away.

“Stay,” Oikawa breathes, his grip loosening and that's _wrong wrong wrong_ because Oikawa _always_ latches on with everything he has, pours his everything into those he loves, and Hajime clenches his other fist past the sharp dig of nails at the disparity of it.

“I know this is selfish.” His chuckle is splintered. “I know I’m a selfish dumbass, but—just let us have this, please. Just for today.”

He can't know if it's the beginning of tears on Oikawa's eyes or just the moving reflection of the screen's light, and—

 _Fucking gods_ , Hajime is so _selfish_.

He just breathes, counts up to nothings, and lets his hand stay—lets this warmth wash over him, too—carding it through Oikawa's hair, first tentative and then with ease as memory takes over to guide him. Oikawa turns back to the movie, face hidden from Hajime's sight.

Hours later, past the snow keen on falling, past the rumble of a world that goes on spinning and the clock blinking over to zeroes of a next day, they stay.

 

 

* * *

  

 

_xi. blacklights/we still find each other in the dark_

 

Of course there would be a blackout.

With the first record-breaking snowfall in fifteen years by mid-December, the coming few weeks would only get worse; of course it’d happen at night—near midnight, even—and _of course_ Oikawa happens to not be out with friends or celebrating a victory with fellow teammates—happens to be in his apartment, instead, alone in the fucking dark, and _of fucking course_ Hajime had been stupid enough to stow away the spare key someplace forgettable.

The dial tone blips into another voicemail. Hajime curses and tries again. He’s already scoured his own apartment for the elusive key and asked the landlady to no avail (“All that room’s spare keys were taken by you and your friends, Iwaizumi-san—”), now weighing the risk of rapping on the door, if the noise would do more harm than good, when _the stupidest idea_ barrels in on him; in this moment, Hajime thinks how it is pretty much a synonym for desperate.

He’s sliding the glass door to the balcony when Oikawa picks up.

“Hey,” Hajime says, quiet and steady and just between them. “Hey,” he tells him again, because in times like this reminders are treasures to infinitely exhaust. _I’m here. We're here._

Hushed breaths cut through the statics from the other side. It's eerily calm, and so Hajime just continues on. “Don't yell, but I’m gonna do something stupid—your level of stupid.” He adds a chuckle at the end of it, and believes it to be lighthearted and breezy as summer wind.

“So just stay there, okay? We _both_ can't afford to be stupid at the same time. I’m gonna hang up for a while but I’ll be back. _You know how I always find you._ So wait for me, okay?”

No response. Hajime ends the call with a heavy breath and heavier heart. He peers over the railing, at the four stories drop to the cold comfort of snow-carpeted concrete, a heralding of snowstorm wailing in his ears, and steels himself against any fear of falling; Tooru is made for the stratosphere and Hajime has spent enough time with him to start loving the sky he will conquer.

To his right is the partition in the way, one on each side of every balcony, solid and unyielding. It takes two to unlock. As much as Hajime wants to just kick it down, tear it apart—

He inhales, long and deep, and swings one leg over the railing. He straddles it and shifts until he's pressed against the partition, feeling around the darkness for a footing on the other side to perch on. He breathes, when he finds it precarious.

Fuck. This is so stupid. He’s so stupid. _Love makes you so fucking stupid._

Breathes, in and out, like before a service ace, the run-up for a killing spike, the crouch before jumping high to block an enemy's.

Breathes, like waking up to find a warmth by his side, grinning silly at him and him smiling back, both of them star-struck by the other’s ever-constant persistent to stay, to always run together.

Time seems to freeze with the climb and crack by the landing of his feet on next-door’s balcony, ice on asphalt giving way to the grind of cars’ wheels. Curtains are drawn closed over the glass, the sliding door thankfully unlocked, and Hajime marches on. He’s in the bedroom, Oikawa's bedroom except it's all _wrong wrong wrong_ , lacks the odds and ends collected over their years. The walls are without posters and glow-in-the-dark paint of a night sky at its brightest, crafted by unskilled hands that left their own blemishing imprints because sometimes they act like a pair of five-year-olds. The dresser’s top is empty of knickknacks, Oikawa's endless line of hair products and framed photos to keep close, and no stray volleyballs or magazines litter the floor. This room looks unlived by Oikawa Tooru.

(And this, Hajime understands, too. He practically sleeps at the kotatsu, even if the hard floorboard hurts his back.)

It's dark, the farther Hajime walks in, and he curses at himself for not bringing a flashlight, digging out his phone and letting it light the way. When he finds him, it's by one of the living room’s walls, the one they share by means of _next door_. Huddled with his back against the barrier, knees drawn up to the chest and face hidden in the crook of his arms, Oikawa keeps his grasp on his own phone, regardless, the tether to Hajime's voice. Hajime catches the glimpse of a galaxy-stained scarf wrapped snuggly around his neck, gleaming phosphorescent.

He kneels down in the softest of landings, lays his phone to the side, screenlight set to never die, and reaches out. He slips his hand into one of Oikawa’s, feels the cold sweat and how he’s trying to quell the tremble, lets him find Hajime and tighten his hold when he does.

“Hey,” Hajime starts, and never ends. “Told you I’d find you.”

Oikawa gives up a choked titter, letting Hajime tug his hand forward, letting it be cradled by Hajime's own, letting himself welcome the warmth. “What the hell took you so long, idiot Iwa-chan.”

“I had to dangle myself from four stories up and risk breaking my bones on the cold, hard ground. You’re welcome.”

“That was stupid,” Oikawa says, voice still dampened. He breathes through his mouth, each gulp of air wet and stuttering. Hajime rubs his thumb along a spot on the soft back of his palm. “How is that my level of stupid? That was stupider than anything I've done.”

Hajime settles down next to him and guides the hand into his lap, carries on kneading at that spot. Oikawa's other clutch on the phone almost relaxes. “Remember when we were kids? We’d dared each other to climb that ginkgo tree in the park. It was around a thirty-meter drop from the top and we were a pair of eight-year-olds. _That_ is definitely the winner here.”

“We hadn't ever reached that high up, though. I was so scared you’d fall off and die so I cried until you came down.”

“Nah, you’d probably saved my life.”

A sniffle, and another chuckle. “You could never resist my tears.”

“When you put it that way, it just sounds gross.”

“ _You_ were the gross one,” Oikawa says around a quivering breath, voice rising. “You collected bugs and took care of them, and played in wet piles of leaves during fall season, and pulled me down to a wrestle in the mud when we were out in the rain, and put a frog on top of my head to scare me, and—and so many gross things, Iwa-chan.”

“You blew raspberries _into my ear_ to wake me up. You drooled on my shoulder when you slept. You poured salt and pepper over my food and let me taste hell. You _stole_ my jacket and shirts and wouldn't return or wash them for _weeks_. And your taste in winter-clothing and their colors is so garish and gross.”

“But you love it,” Oikawa breathes. _You love me, anyway_ , and Hajime finds no words to deny it altogether. _I love all of you, anyway._

Instead, Hajime plucks the phone out of Oikawa's slack grip, another screenlight set to never dim, and lays it down, too. Reaching out again (always reaching out, always reaching up, things to infinitely exhaust), he cradles the sides of Oikawa's head, gentlest yet firm, like holding hands.

“It's not that dark out here,” Hajime tells him, and thinks it's something to infinitely exhaust as well.

Oikawa allows him to tip his head up even if his eyes are kept shut, wandering around the more familiar darkness of his own making, a comfort behind closed lids. “We’ve got the lights from both of our phones, and your scarf is making me see black dots as always with how bright it is. _And the stars are always there_ , even if you can't find them right now.” Hajime leans in, bumps their foreheads together, and stays. “So you can see me. You can always see me. Heck, even if you don't, I’ll be here, _anyway_. People look at you and think you're the clingy one, but I’m clingy that way, yeah?”

In this lack for distance between them, they breathe, and they stay. And Oikawa might've shivered a bit with taking in that first gulp of air but he opens his eyes, anyway, and keeps on breathing. And past the propensity of first-time lovers to grow distant and fall out of love, Hajime presses a kiss to his forehead, like a promise to heal all sorts of wounds, something to infinitely exhaust, and determines to keep this close.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_xii._

 

“Ah, Hajime-kun,” a flower-shop owner greets happily, the following summer. “Dear, it's been such a long time since I last saw you! Almost a year, yes.” She nods to herself, as if confirming a hypothesis.

Hajime just raises his eyebrows (and maybe curses the Iwaizumi gene a little, because Oikawa always teases him for not being able to lift just one) and bends forward so she can tuck a stem of daisy behind an ear.

“Daisies, for faith,” she says, crow's feet deepening as she smiles. “I’ve always had faith in you boys.”

Hajime chuckles. “I think we're both a little too old to be called boys anymore.”

She clicks her tongue, shakes her head. “I’m sixty years old. You two will always be boys to me.” She ambles to stand at the counters, hands on her hips, a wall of glass shelves stocked full with flowers and embroidered with vines an endless spectrum behind her. “It's even stranger to see you without Tooru-kun,” she muses. “What can I help you with?”

Hajime puts his hands in his hoodie's pockets, fingers entwining and untwisting in some nervous rhythm. “Oikawa—Tooru loves this place. He likes flowers.” He feels the tip of his ears heat up when it comes out like a question, but obaachan has already widened her smile in return. “And he likes symbolism, like how the constellations refer to their myths and legends.”

“Ah, you want to send him a message in hanakotoba, then?”

“Yeah.”

“I can do that, dear.” She winks at him, and Hajime grins and chuckles despite all embarrassment. “Just say say the words.”

“ _Next time_ ,” Hajime says. “ _To always persist, and start anew_.”

_“Iwa-chaaaaann!”_

Hajime jumps, whipping his head around to check the coast outside. Behind him, obaachan laughs, hearty.

“Shit, I think he might've found me.” With a hand on the door, he turns around, says, “Keep this a secret, obaachan,” and when she just smiles, somewhat knowing and mischievous, he deems to take it in stride, for now.

He finds Oikawa three stores away, a near busted mission on Hajime’s part. He’s eyeing a baker's ingredients shop with a glint in his eyes, and Hajime prepares to sigh but doesn't, in the end, when Oikawa just turns and beams at him. “Look,” he says, cutely reverent. “Fifty-five percent discount. Iwa-chan, this is a call from the stars. We need to perfect our recipe.”

“It's already great. You’re just looking for excuses to make more of it. _‘But the ingredients will be wasted if we don't use them, Iwa-chan_.”

Oikawa wrinkles his nose. “Your imitation of my sweet voice is so gross, Iwa-chan.”

Hajime hums. It’s a nice mild sunny weather, today. “Race you to Inokashira Park. Winner chooses the movie next Thursday.”

And Oikawa grins, always ready for a challenge, from volleyball to finding a home to keeping Hajime by his side, to stay by Hajime's side. “You’re on.”

**Author's Note:**

> ~~Jazz a.k.a. the beta please don't be disappointed in me for posting this when you aren't done with it I have a problem with impulse control okay AND DON'T BLAME YOURSELF all mistakes are on me >.<~~
> 
> *sweats nervously* I couldn't think of anything else besides this and that was bad bc I have other fics with deadlines. This could've been better but I just needed to post it so I could think clearer. Maybe. I hope. idk
> 
> For those who finished reading, thank you! ~~Please validate my efforts.~~ Please let me know what you think ^^ I'm new to writing and looking forward to learn more, so feedback and advice are also appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](http://astersandstuffs.tumblr.com/) || [twitter](https://twitter.com/astersandstuffs/) (Needed one for [this zine](https://haikyuu2ndyears.tumblr.com/), so I just made it a few days ago ^^)


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